Semiconductor memories, such as flash memory and other types of memories, are often manufactured on a semiconductor wafer (or other material). Reticles are used to print circuits (or images of circuits) on the wafer. The reticle is moved across a wafer for a plurality of shots. Because the memory die is rectangular and the wafer is round, there will be dies printed at the edges for which a portion of the die is off the edge of the wafer, thereby making the die incomplete (and referred to as a partial memory die). For example, FIG. 1 depicts a wafer 10. A plurality of instances of a memory system are fabricated on wafer 10. Each instance of the memory system will become a memory die. Eventually, wafer 10 will be cut into separate dies in a process referred to as singulation. FIG. 1 shows dies A, B, C, D, E, F and G of wafer 10. It is likely that wafer 10 will include other dies in addition to A-G; however, those other dies are not depicted to make FIG. 1 easier to read. As can been seen, dies A-F are formed within the boundary of wafer 10. However, die G is fabricated at the edge of wafer 10 such that a portion of what should have been die G is off the edge of wafer 10 and, therefore, missing from die G. As a result, die G is a partial memory die.
In the past, partial memory dies were discarded because they were missing components and, therefore, did not function properly.